Sunday, 11 September 2016

We covered Trampled By Turtles' first ever Festival Palomino last year. It was such a great learning experience for us, and we had a great time... so much that it made it onto my top ten favorite shows from 2014 …

The third annual Festival Palomino has been moved to Historic Hall’s Island (in the same area as Boom Island in Minneapolis). While the official reason given on August 30th about the move was “due to major storms and flooding which delayed construction at Canterbury Park”, we actually think it is because of scheduling conflict with the live horse racing, booked for this same day. We knew about the conflict in late September and talked about it offline and wondered about the fate of Festival Palomino.

Anyway, as usual, we’ve written (and seen live) about most of the bands on the bill at the 2016 festival, including headliner Trampled By Turtles, Scotland’s Frightened Rabbit, England’s Jake Bugg, etc.

One of the few artists we haven’t written about is Margaret Glaspy, touring in support of her debut album Emotions and Math (ATO Records). Be sure to show up early to check out Glaspy’s set.

NOTE: With the Minneapolis’ noise ordinance in effect, the music will have to end around 10pm. Trample By Turtles may continue to play, however, they will have to go acoustic - similar to how Wilco handled their recent Hall’s Island appearance on 20 August 2016.

Peckham-based trio Beaty Heart (Charlie Rotberg, Joshua Mitchell and James Moruzzi) will be headlining the 7th Street Entry this Saturday, September 17th. You may recall that they had to cancel their entire 2014 USA tour due to VISA issues, when they were supposed to promote their debut album Mixed Blessings.

Beaty Heart is back, this time, promoting their sophomore album Till The Tomb, which came out earlier this Summer via Harvest Records.

Electronic producer Gold Panda will once again headline the Triple Rock Social Club in Minneapolis this Saturday, September 17th. We previously caught him at the Triple Rock in 2013 and noted, “Gold Panda didn't have any gimmicks, masked or otherwise, his setup was a rather large table with all the buttons and switches. Set included a mix of various singles and songs from Half Of Where You Live, particularly "Brazil" which played fairly early in.”

Gold Panda’s latest record Good Luck and Do Your Best is out now on City Slang Records.

Carrie Newcomer will be playing at the Hennepin Methodist Church this September 17th, 2016. Newcomer’s 16th CD, The Beautiful Not Yet, will be out Sept 16th.
The new record was produced by Juno Award for World Music winner Jayme Stone.

With the choice in venue (a church), expect plenty of optimistic, spiritual songs from Newcomer.

Friday we have Gold Panda. The UK electronic artist is touring for his second album Half Of Where You Live, but expect a new EP on November 11th called Reprise…

Gold Panda is currently on tour in support of his second album Half Of Where You Live, stopping by the Triple Rock Social Club in Minneapolis last night, October 4th.

VOICES OF BLACK

The first of the three bands was Voices of Black, a chill/low-tempo duo from New Jersey.
The two said that this was their first time in Minneapolis and they were in such a good mood. The audience responded with an equally good attitude.

The thing about Voices of Black is that the two sing in unison over preprogrammed beats, except for the saxophone, which was used for the finale "Get Enough". The title track is from their forthcoming EP Get Enough, which is coming out October 20th on Notown Records.

SLOW MAGIC

I was rather impressed with Slow Magic, particularly with his color-changing custom fox (or wolf?) mask. Slow Magic kept changing the pace, keeping the show visually and musically interesting. Sometime he'll bang his drums, sometime he'll play in the audience, sometime he'll get the audience to push on his interactive music pad. Then during "Hold Still", his secret weapon of two "imaginary friends" jumped on stage to bang out on the two floor toms.

Gold Panda didn't have any gimmicks, masked or otherwise, his setup was a rather large table with all the buttons and switches.
Set included a mix of various singles and songs from Half Of Where You Live, particularly "Brazil" which played fairly early in.

Gold Panda spent his whole set hardly speaking and instead concentrating on keeping songs flowing in and out. That's what he's there for, keeping the dancefloor moving and with his mysterious button pushing and levels mixing. The younger audience loved it, clearly this was the perfect music for them to dance Friday night into Saturday without any breaks.

If you love dancing, this current Voices of Black, Slow Magic, and Gold Panda bill is perfect for you. All three are making their way across America ending mid-October, so you'll have at least one week to check them out live.

Friday we have
Gold Panda. The UK electronic artist is touring for his second album Half Of Where You Live, but expect a new EP on November 11th called Reprise, which includes alternative and new version of tracks from the second album. Read more about Gold Panda here.

Tuesday, 03 September 2013

The Dodos came on stage around 9pm to a healthy room of young people, mostly college students and high schoolers. The youngest I saw at the show was a ten year old boy, who told me he heard of the Dodos from a "longboard" skate video.
.…

What's new with the Dodos? The San Francisco band just recently released Carrier, last week (August 27th) via Polyvinyl Records, which Paste Magazine said was like "the sound of starting over."

Carrier came out on CD, LP (180 gram blue vinyl), cassette (limited edition of 100 white cassettes) and all digital outlets. The band will tour in support of the new album - be sure to check out their television appearance with The Late Show with David Letterman tonight (September 3rd) to perform their single, "Confidence".

We mentioned Gold Panda a few times already, but just a reminder that Gold Panda will be at the Triple Rock Social Club in Minneapolis this October 4th.

You may remember that this DJ/mixer/producer got the Guardian's approval when they named his debut the "2010 Guardian First Album award".

With the release of his new album Half of Where You Live, Gold Panda is on a massive North American tour this year.

Rolling Stone called Half of Where You Live,
"The pace of [Gold Panda’s] second LP is quicker, but the style is happily the same ... The album was inspired by world travel, but it has a pleasantly isolated feel: a portable home, conjured between headphones."

Heavier sound? That's probably because it's not so poppy with women vocals, as Gold Panda explained, "I've tried to really focus on just a few elements. I tried to avoid chopped up female vocals this time around, as it’s become pretty well done, and anything that was too solid structurally. Ultimately, though, you just find your groove…"

Trying to define the popular music genres of San Francisco is difficult, if not impossible. Some terms used to describe local bands playing in the Bay Area are psychedelic cave techno, cloud-rap, melodic hardcore
.…

You may recall that we've been talking about Gold Panda since The Guardian announced Gold Panda as "2010 Guardian First Album award".

With the new album on the verge of release, a massive North American tour is on the way. It's kicking off September 11th at the Basement in Georgia. This is the perfect time to catch Gold Panda in smaller venues (as opposed to massive festivals like Glasto and Longitude).

Said The Whale is touring and will be performing at the Cedar Cultural Center on July 18. The band is from Vancouver and consists of songwriters Tyler Bancroft and Ben Worcester, drummer Spencer Schoening, keyboardist Jaycelyn Brown and bassist Nathan Shaw. They formed in 2007 and released Howe Sounds/Taking Abalonia in 2008. Other albums quickly followed: Islands Disappear (2009) and Little Mountain (2012). These albums earned much attention from the media and so they produced a documentary, Winning America.

Said The Whale was nominated for two JUNO Awards in 2013 for Alternative Album of the Year. The band just released another new collection of songs consisting of three songs, the I Love You EP. Catch them if you get a chance!

Chelsea Wolfe's third album Pain is Beauty, is coming out on Sargent House this year. The album is a love letter to nature, as Wolfe described the album as, "an exploration of ancestry, how the mythology, landscapes and traditions of our ancestors affect our personalities today. Honesty is what initially drew me to music, and I've been more honest and open with myself than ever through these songs. There is peace in truth. There is clarity in solitude. And there is power within simplicity and focus. Love is not always easy. Tormented love is something I understand more than society's skewed idea of what love should be. Love is indelible, severe, earnest, merciful. To push forward against the odds is to make history".

Wednesday, 13 July 2011

From the looks of things, this Melbourne-based electro duo, Prudence "Prue" Rees-Lee and Alex Nosek, are Hammocks and Honey. Not sure which is the hammock and which is the honey.

What makes H&H interesting (and why they're here) is that they have a very limited 250 solid gold 12" vinyl called Spellbinder that was released last November 2010. I half-imagine postage is a killer no thanks to its weight in gold.

All kidding aside, they're back with a Spellbinder Remixes album, which, what else, remixes of their songs by different DJs. The EP is FREE, the note I have is that it'll be available on Thursday, July 14th, but I just went to bandcamp.com, and the EP is available to download now. It's free check it out, and if you like what you heard, they are doing some dates in Australia and New Zealand:

Goldroom is basically Josh Legg, based out of Los Angeles. He is also in a synthpop band called NightWaves. With only three original songs (Morgan's Bay, City Girls, and Nights In Nantes), he seems more comfortable remixing other people and putting together his own themed mixtapes.

Recently he released a remix of Penguin Prison's song "Fair Warning". You can hear the effort on a popular hour mixtape at Aeroplane's June 2011 mix, but for those with only minutes to spare, I suggest you just listen to it by itself at Soundcloud, or better yet, download his free track, "Morgan's Bay".

The Sundelles are originally from California, but they've moved to Brooklyn, New York, which they described as "loneliness of the East Coast". The band, lead by Sam Sundos, came up with their name as a nod to Phil Spector girl groups of the 60s (The Ronettes, The Crystals).

They have a couple of releases, Death Youth 7" (which looks like a perfect Coke commercial on the cover artwork) and their debut album, Georgia Swan, both in 2010.

The free track they've given to us is "Gold", which is the first track off Georgia Swan. It sounds very Beach Boys-ey.

Just quickly, I wanted to mention that Gold Panda has a free song, "MPB" at his website.
The song isn't even from an upcoming release or part of his Lucky Shiner album. The song was announced along with a series of massive festivals (including Glasto and Latitude).

If you can't get enough, you can stream his Marriage EP at soundcloud. Details of the EP:

The "Marriage" single comes packaged with three very different remixes: UK producer Star Slinger cuts the track into a frantic halftime beat and drenches it in ecstatic synth pads; Los Angeles bedroom auteur Baths bakes the track into a honey-dripped analog confection, adding warm rhodes and wisps of his own falsetto vocals; and UK artist Forest Swords strips away everything but the melody, offering a slow-moving tribal rite—all gently plucked acoustic guitars, reverb’d drums, and eerily chanted vocals. "Marriage" will be available on March 1st digitally and as a limited 12" for Record Store Day on April 16th.

Saturday, 19 February 2011

NPR calls Gold Panda "best new electronic music" last year and The Guardian awarded him as "2010 Guardian First Album award", and based on hearing Lucky Shiner (released September 2010 via Ghostly Records), they both are onto something.

I don't listen to electronic music that often, but I do know what I like, generally a good beat and grooves, but not too thumpy. What it also does well is to not sound repetive and each song do not sound like the other. The good news is that songs on Lucky Shiner sounds different from each other. I'll give you an example, "You" sounds very Eastern/Indian sitar type, followed by an electronic "Vanilla", and still followed by a very acoustic song called "Parents".

One of the stronger track on here, "Marriage", sounds like what Moby would do in 1990. There's lots of earthy and man-made sound, they all give the song a very international vibe to it, especially with the airplane noises. I'm glad to see that he's chosen that song as a new single, because starting April 16th, you can get a limited 12" of Marriage as a single for Record Store Day (however the digital single will be available on March 1st). The single comes with the original mix, appearing on Lucky Shiner as well as three other remixes by Star Slinger, Baths, and Forest Swords.

Gold Panda is touring all 2011, will be back in the US for SXSW, so I'll try and catch him there:

La Roux recently released The Gold Edition digitally via amazon.com and iTunes on February 8th. I didn't know this, but amazon offered this album as an exclusive and will ship you a CD-R when you order it: This product is manufactured on demand using CD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.

Anyway, I don't have this new release, but I couldn't pass up this news on account of the 'gold' theme.
Tracklisting below:

Ethan Gold's album, Songs From a Toxic Apartment was released in January 11th, 2011, via his own label, Gold Records.

I don't have the album for review, but I did like what I heard from the free song, "Come On Beat It Down", which sounds a bit like a poppy Elliott Smith.

Speaking of influences, it looks like he's been doing a series of cover songs, number four in this series is New Order's "Age of Consent". You can watch it here on youtube.com (or click after the break).

Ethan writes (transcribed by me):

BEDROOM CLOSET COVERSNumber Four

New Order "Age of Consent"

My high school band covered New Order. They may be a gateway drug to fascism but it is a balum for the burning blue soul when these tones bast a car's speakers driving nowhere too fast on a rainy night.

This was my first time making loops live.

I mess up towards the end & give a guilty look. [Bernard] Sumner always looks upset when he plays though so it's OK.

As a cover lover, I can tell you that it's hard to top New Order, but this cover sounds pretty faithful to the original.